


Subtlety

by lanyon



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: F/M, M/M, No marks for originality here!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-18
Updated: 2013-05-18
Packaged: 2017-12-12 06:00:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/808113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lanyon/pseuds/lanyon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spock discovers why Kirk has been avoiding him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Subtlety

**Title:** Subtlety  
 **Pairing:** Evolving Kirk/Spock; Spock/Uhura; Kirk/Some Random Chick  
 **Rating:** PG13, mostly for swearing.  
 **Word Count:** 4,630ish.  
 **Summary:** Spock discovers why Kirk has been avoiding him.

In response to [this prompt](http://community.livejournal.com/st_xi_kink/379.html?thread=692859#t692859) at [](http://st-xi-kink.livejournal.com/profile)[**st_xi_kink**](http://st-xi-kink.livejournal.com/) , although it went off on a bit of a tangent and I may not have actually addressed the prompt after all. Uh. Maybe I'll write a sequel to address the second part of the prompt but I'm all written out for now.

_Spock/Kirk (with a side of Uhura if you'd like)_

_Kirk has been skirting around Spock ever since he learned that Spock and Kirk Prime were lovers. Spock 2.0 is intrigued and confused by his captain's behavior and tries to pursue him to get answers. Uhura, seeing what it's really all about, goes to Kirk and/or Spock and informs him/them that they have her blessing. Confused/inexperienced!Spock and Kirk being gentle._

_(Bonus if Uhura thinks they're hot together like any good slash fangirl)_

 

\--

James T Kirk is a battering ram of a man. He appreciates subtlety, in the manner of an amused onlooker, but heaven forfend that he should waste time indulging in such delicacies. Subtlety is a spectator sport and a human is only as polished as the company he keeps. Kirk is currently sitting in a bar with Bones and they are butting heads and knocking corners off each other’s corners so that they are all spikes and barbs, softened only slightly by copious amounts of beer.

Jim buys another round, complete with whiskey chasers. Bones raises an eyebrow. “Dammit, Jim. I’m a doctor, not an alcoholic.”

“I owe you for the numb-tongue, man.” James squints at him. “I’m returning the favour, ‘s’all.”

\--

Spock has neither the time nor the inclination to be a student of human foibles and gestures but he is not blind to how restless Uhura becomes towards the end of their formal meal with Starfleet Admirals, the Vulcan Ambassador and other Federation representatives (most of whom, he feels, have come to observe an endangered species in the unnatural habitat of a five star restaurant). Uhura’s impatience is betrayed by a soft exhalation at the suggestion of post-prandial drinks and the way her fingers tighten in her serviette because she has already managed to drink rather a lot this evening. By Spock’s count, it has been two glasses of Prosecco, two glasses of red wine and three glasses of white wine, one of which was his.

“You would rather be ...”

“Anywhere but here,” she says as he helps her sway and wobble into her coat, half an hour later.

“I was going to say ‘carousing with the Captain and the Chief Medical Officer’,” replies Spock with the mild twitch of his lips that indicates humour.

Uhura looks affronted and her nostrils flare slightly. “When Captain Kirk and Doctor McCoy go carousing, it generally results in criminal behaviour, which may or may not involve roadsigns and local wildlife.”

“Then we should consider ourselves lucky that the wildlife indigenous to this region consists mainly of Starfleet cadets.”

“Poor Starfleet cadets,” murmurs Uhura, who seems somewhat distracted in the midst of her inebriation and normally Spock would be the first to notice (except that he is also distracted).

“I suppose that we should locate the ...”

“Miscreants?”

“... wayward crew and ...”

“Pour them back on board?”

“ ... escort them back to the Enterprise,” says Spock, marginally puzzled by Uhura’s turns of phrase this evening. Normally so measured in her manner of speech (an occupational hazard), she oscillates between euphemism and insult and Spock wonders if it is wise to seek out Kirk and Bones while she is currently so uninhibited.

\--

Uhura and Spock find Jim and Bones easily enough or, rather, they find Bones, leaning against the wall of a pub called the Lucky Irishman, with one arm wrapped around his ribs. He raises his hand, blood-jagged knuckles and all, and gestures towards the door.

“Look for the brawl,” he enunciates clearly. “Jim is in the thick of it.”

“Take the Doctor back to the ship,” says Spock abruptly, brows knitting together briefly, because he thought that, as Captain of a starship, Kirk might have begun to conduct himself rather better. A Vulcan should know better than to seek comfort in a fool’s hope. He takes a deep breath and pushes open the door of the pub.

(There is nothing like a Vulcan nerve pinch to settle an argument over who spilled whose pint.)

\--

Jim is sure that this must be some contravention of Federation laws. He is trying to burrow deeper into his bed and the blessed sanctuary of pillows and scratchy, synthetic sheets and a duvet, wrapped snugly around his ankles.

“I was thinking,” he mumbles into his pillows, “how great it is being Captain. Y’get your own quarters. Undisturbed by the anyone. Unless there’s a ‘mergency. Is there a ‘mergency, Lieutenant Uhura?”

Uhura is leaning against the far wall, pinching the bridge of her nose and perhaps warding off her own hangover. “The only _emergency_ ,” she emphasises, “is that it is past thirteen hundred hours and the captain of this starship is still in bed.”

Jim lifts his head from the pillows and, even in his dehydrated, pained and pitiful state, he manages to leer at Uhura, although his cheeks are flushed with sleep and his lip is split and caked with dried blood and he cannot open his blackened eye. “And they sent the prettiest girl on the ship to get me out of bed?” He coughs and it hurts like a bitch but he gamely continues. “Surely even Commander Spock can see that _that_ is illogical.”

He has closed his eyes before he can interpret the small twitch of Uhura’s lips. “ _Commander_ Spock,” she says, again with the delicate emphasis, “felt it prudent that someone escort you to the sickbay. He said that it was logical for you to refuse treatment last night, while both you and Bones were not – how did he phrase it? – In your right minds? You have no such excuse this morning.”

“And why couldn’t my first officer tell me this himself?” Jim turns over and sprawls on his back. Uhura averts her gaze. “I think he feels a bit guilty about last night.”

“Vulcans can feel guil--,” Jim begins before he interrupts himself. “Last night? What did he do last night?”

“I told him you wouldn’t remember,” Uhura says tartly. “You were in quite a state when we brought you back.”

Jim raises his head but that hurts his neck and shoulders so he falls back with a soft _flumph_. He lifts up one hand. “Tell that bastard Bones that I’ll be done in ten – no, fifteen minutes.”

Uhura turns to leave before turning back. “You’re going to go back to sleep, aren’t you, Captain?”

“Yes, I’m,” replies Jim and he promptly drifts back into an unsettled sleep, faintly concerned as to why Spock feels guilty when Jim has been so careful.

\--

“You didn’t tell him?” Bones shows no consideration for the hungover inhabitant of his sickbay, the force of his exclamation as explosive as ever.

“I thought Spock could tell him himself,” says Uhura and even from his near-comatose, death bed state, Jim can see the smirk on her face.

“Did I do—” he begins. “Why aren’t you hungover?”

“Because she didn’t decide to sample every damn brew in an Irish theme bar!” snarls Bones and he is like a bear with a sore head which, Kirk supposes, is a pretty accurate description.

“Is Spock hungover?” Jim asks hopefully because then, he thinks, he might be on an even footing with his first officer. “Do Vulcans get hangovers?”

“No and yes,” says Bones. “Bad ones, so be thankful for small mercies.”

“Oh, and another thing.” Jim rolls over, onto his face, and whatever he is about to ask or state is lost to his pillow and a stifled grunt.

“Trust an Iowa farmboy to snore like a tractor,” says Bones. “He’s fine, you know. Tell the Vulcan to chillax a little. No lasting damage has been done to our illustrious captain.”

“He’ll be pissed when he finds out,” says Uhura. “Maybe.”

“No maybe about it,” says Bones and his expression lightens somewhat. He might have something to enjoy today after all.

\--

“It is sixteen hundred hours.”

“Yes, Commander Spock.”

“Does the Captain intend to rise at all today?”

“The Captain doesn’t,” says Uhura, very carefully. “He says that he is staging a one-man mutiny.”

Spock sighs, a line appearing between his eyebrows, so brief that it might not have been there at all and his expression assumes its usual neutral state, his consternation well-concealed, though no less unsettling. “Did you explain to the Captain that mutiny is rather counter-intuitive when one is already the commanding officer of the ship? He is, in effect, mutinying against himself?”

“And against Bones,” adds Uhura. “He’s definitely mutinying against Bones. Did you know that Kirk has a fear of hyposprays? At least, when they’re wielded by Doctor McCoy?”

“By our captain’s standards, that is a relatively logical fear.” Spock makes no mention of Kirk’s fear of healthy food, non-alcoholic beverages and regular working hours which, he is assured, add character to his personality. He does not deny this although he firmly believes that Captain Kirk has abundant personality; he has so much personality that it overflows in all the wrongs places. Spock stands up, pulling down the hem of his uniform tunic. Briefly pinching the bridge of his nose, and there is something about this particular human that brings out his own most human characteristics, he accepts that the time has come to go to the sickbay.

\--

“How can he still be asleep?”

Bones enjoys Spock’s aghast expression (now that he can recognise what the Vulcan version of ‘aghast’ is). “He’s hungover and he tired himself out running around the sickbay trying to avoid having a vitamin shot.” Bones grins (those were some fun times). “You know, if ever you disagree with him, just threaten him with some kind of vaccination.”

Spock pauses and, for a brief shining moment, Bones thinks that he might be taking the suggestion under advisement. Of course he is to be disappointed, when Spock replies that it would be unethical.

“It’s okay; your way is just as effective.” Bones slaps Spock on the shoulder, earning a raised eyebrow. “I’m off to get some food before that Russian kid eats us out of house and home. You keep an eye on the invalid. I don’t think he’s going anywhere.”

“That is slim consolation,” says Spock and he walks over to where the Captain is sleeping, head underneath the pillow, which causes another brief moment of puzzlement. Spock sits down and crosses his legs and folds his hands together.

“It’s freaky if you’re watching me sleep. Just so’s you know.”

There is a pause (maybe even a shocked pause). “You are hiding under a pillow, Captain. How could you possibly know what I am doing or, indeed, that it is me?”

“Because I’m just that good.”

“Jim.” (And the shape under the bedclothes moves; he is always surprised when Spock addresses him by his first name.) “We need to talk.”

“Oh.”

“Yes.” And another pause. “It would be easier if I could actually look at you.”

\--

Jim figures that talking to a Vulcan is like some sort of autism. When he was a kid, he had the attention span of a flea, and the school ran all sorts of tests on him. The verdict was juvenile delinquent but he remembered hearing that people with autism have a tough time reading facial expressions. Jim fervently believes that anyone would have a tough time reading Spock’s expressions, although Uhura is a better interpreter than most and, on more than one occasion, she has informed Jim that Spock is angry with him and Jim has had no idea. Jim is so expressive and enjoys getting a rise out of anyone he meets but riling Spock is not nearly as satisfying when it carries with it a distinct risk of asphyxiation. He does get some pleasure from knowing that Spock needs to read his expression too (even if he does feel short-changed in this exchange).

“You are not going to vomit, are you?”

(Evidently, Jim’s current expression is nauseated. The Vulcan is good.)

“You are avoiding me, Captain.”

“No, I’m not. I’m hungover. I’m avoiding everyone.” (Jim looks remarkably cheerful about this fact.)

“You are not angry with me?”

That throws Jim. He responds cautiously. “Should I be?”

“I do not know.” Spock hates to admit a lack of certainty on his part but he suspects there is some truth that needs to be uncovered. He also hates to admit insecurity but he is quite certain that Jim avoids him, except when he is on the bridge (although there was one occasion when Jim wasn’t talking to him and relayed every message through the unfortunate Chekov even when they were both in the same room). “You do not like me much, do you?”

Jim looks at him askance. “What gave you that idea? I mean, except for the time when you were right and I was wrong over that thing with those guys?”

Spock has no idea what Jim is talking about but that is becoming a distressingly regular occurrence. “I am often right when you are wrong, Captain.”

Jim sits up on the bed, which is really too narrow for a man of his size, but Bones assured him that there was no alternative. He turns to face Spock, tucking his feet against the bed railing and wrapping his arms around his knees and Spock is struck with an unsettling realisation. James Kirk sits on his bed like a child who has been allowed to stay at home from school and it is easy to forget when he is sitting in his chair on the bridge, barking out orders or flirting with Uhura, but he is young. He is very young and he is human.

“You have been avoiding me since the incident with the Narada,” Spock says abruptly.

“I made you my first officer.”

“There was no better candidate for the job.” It is not vanity or egotism, of course; it is fact. “I think, Captain, that you have been avoiding me since your encounter with my older counterpart on Delta Vega.”

Jim’s eyes fly open. “You – you know about that?” He looks around cautiously, and maybe a little guiltily, but realises that the universe is still very much in existence around them.

“Yes,” says Spock. “I met him shortly afterwards.”

“That _bastard_ ,” says Jim, his eyes widening and his cheeks becoming flushed. Spock idly thinks he looks considerably healthier now that his waxy complexion has been consumed by ire. “That old _bastard_! He lied to me!”

“He _inferred_ ,” says Spock.

“He _cheated.”_

“Which you should surely understand.”

“Are you saying I’m a--? Actually, don’t answer that. He cheated. He lied. He was dishonest. He...” Jim trails off and his expression slides from anger to surprise to hope. “He can lie!”

“You seem strangely pleased at the supposition of my counterpart’s dishonesty.”

“No, but ... if he lied about the whole universe going ...” Jim gesticulates to indicate, presumably, the utter devastation and collapse of the universe. “He could totally have lied in that mind-meld thing!”

Spock is shocked. He is visibly shocked. He is _speechless_ with shock. Jim, so enthralled by his own intelligence, fails to notice. He claps Spock on the shoulder. “Spock, you’re off the hook!”

He gets to his feet and, for someone who was near-death mere moments previously, he looks remarkably healthy as he saunters off, a jaunty off-key whistle on his lips.

\--

“Did you tell him?”

“I could not.”

“You’re really taking this to heart, aren’t you?”

“Do not sound so pleased, Doctor McCoy. I merely meant that I could not get a word in edgeways.”

Bones’ smile grows wider. “You mean that you’re too chicken to tell the Captain that you used that Vulcan nerve-pinch shit on him in a crowded bar, in front of two dozen Starfleet Cadets, while he was totally shitfaced.”

Spock stands up and, with the utmost dignity, leaves without another word.

\--

A week passes, during which Kirk is noticeably upbeat, although he never showed much interest in drills and exercises before.

“Why are you so damned _happy?_ ” growls Bones. He, on the other hand, has not had a good week. A pair of ensigns ran into each other on the first day of drills and there was concussion on all sides. His week has not improved; indeed, it has deteriorated with every _Kirk out_ and elaborate exercise. Scotty has enjoyed every last minute of it and is positively vibrating on the spot with sheer excitement over the ship’s capabilities.

“You come back when you’re the youngest Starfleet Captain and you tell me.” Kirk steals Bones’ glass and takes a swig of water before he struts away.

Bones watches him leave, his eyebrow rising with the utmost perturbation, and he turns to Scotty, who beams.

“Seriously, what’s he on? I know I didn’t prescribe happy pills.” Bones does not add, _tempting though it is._

“Cap’n got laid,” says Scotty. For the first time, he looks slightly less than delighted. “He insisted on sharing all the gory details with me. Do I look like a girl, Bones? Do I _look_ like I’m starving for that sort of information?”

\--

Even Spock notices how happy the Captain is. Even Spock is unsettled by it, mostly because this good mood has its origin in a misconception. (He does not accept that one night of sexual intercourse could have such a dramatic effect on a person’s mood.)

“What is it, Spock?”

“You wish to talk to me?”

“No, Spock, you wish to talk to _me_. You’ve been following me around for most of the shift.”

“Captain, the bridge is a confined area. The likelihood of appearing to follow another person is—”

“Spock.”

“Yes, Captain?”

 

“What’s on your mind?”

“I do not think that you could comprehend what my mind can encompass, Captain.”

Jim does not even roll his eyes; he is immune to frustration today. “Well, something’s got your panties in a twist.”

Spock does not even know how to begin to address that accusation.

\--

Jim is pale. He is as pale as he was on the Day of his Hangover, which is deserving of capitalisation.

“So. You’re saying what I saw in that mind-meld actually happened? It wasn’t a lie or – or – or?”

For the first time, Spock is worried about James Kirk. It is not simply that he is stuttering and incapable of finishing a sentence. Spock is concerned that whatever Kirk was shown by his older counterpart was terribly traumatic or horrifying. He asks, tentatively, “What did you see?”

Jim looks at him and shakes his head mutely. “You don’t want to know. I’m just saying, if you value what you have with Uhura, you don’t want to know.”

Vulcans are a curious race; they would not have been so technologically advanced if they did not constantly question and seek to better themselves. Spock’s curiosity is piqued.

“I fail to see how knowledge obtained in a mind-meld between another version of myself and you could be quite so distressing.”

“That,” says Jim, pausing significantly, “is because you haven’t taken the other version of me into account.”

He sits down and gesticulates. “Come on. Meld me or whatever. You’ll see.”

“Captain, I do not believe that this is the wisest course of action.”

“You know what they say about the Captain going down with the ship?”

A perplexed silence and then, “Yes.”

“Well. You’re coming down with me.”

\--

“The other Captain Kirk was all over the other you like a heat rash on a summer’s day?” Uhura is stunned, mostly by the turn of phrase than by Spock’s great revelation.

“It is how our Captain worded it,” says Spock glumly, saying nothing of Kirk’s other choice descriptions. “I could not think of an alternative way to phrase it without delving too deeply into those memories.”

Uhura smiles and places her hands on Spock’s cheeks and it is human and gentle and tender. “It does explain why he’s been avoiding you all this time.”

“Indeed,” says Spock, closing his eyes and resting his forehead against Uhura’s before his eyes fly open again. “With that mental imagery, it is a wonder that he has been able to look me in the face.”

“And you, Commander? Can you look Captain Kirk in the face now?”

Spock sighs softly. “Give me time.” He pulls back from Uhura’s touch. She smiles at him and nods.

\--

“You’re avoiding me, Spock,” says Jim.

“You – you are at breakfast,” says Spock. It is breakfast time and James Tiberius Kirk is drinking a mug of coffee in the mess with every semblance of being conscious and alert.

“Because you’re avoiding me.”

“Captain, I am not avoiding you. It is simply coincidence that our paths have not crossed in the past few days.”

“Coincidence, my ass. You make the duty roster.” Jim throws up his hands with impatience. “One thing I’ll say about the other Spock – he could at least lie convincingly.”

Spock bows his head and Jim feels a little bad at witnessing this intense expression of discomfort. “Look,” he says, clapping Spock on the shoulder and earning a flinch for his troubles. “Come to my quarters at twenty hundred hours. We’ll have dinner and work out whatever the fuck we need to work out.”

“And if I refuse?”

“It’s an order, Commander.”

\--

Spock sighs. He has been sighing a lot, recently. He tugs down the bottom of his uniform tunic and presents himself at the Captain’s quarters promptly at 8 o’clock.

“Spock, you’re early!” says Kirk, chipper and pulling on a sweater.

“No, Captain. I am on time.”

Kirk blinks. “Oh, so you are. Come on in, sit down, make yourself comfortable.” He gestures to a table in the corner of the room, on which a fairly decent spread is evident.

Spock sits down, at the very edge of a chair, back ramrod straight as he watches Jim flitting around his room, looking for socks and shoes, and Spock is bound to wonder how he finds anything in this squalor. Finally, Jim comes and sits or sprawls opposite Spock.

“So.”

“Yes, Captain?”

“No, I think a good start would be if you call me Jim.”

“You tend to react rather strongly when I call you Jim.”

“Yeah, see, that’s because it’s a surprise. Every freaking time, it’s a surprise. I figure if you make a habit of calling me by, you know, my _name_ , I might get used to it. Hey, and so might you!”

“I will endeavour to do so. Jim.”

“Atta boy, Spock.” Jim indicates the food in front of them, all of which seems designed to raise cholesterol to a heart attack-inducing degree. “Eat up.”

“Very well, Sir.”

“ _Sir_ is not _Jim_.”

“Sorry, Jim,” says Spock and he raises his eyes to look at Jim, who is fidgeting with his sleeves and appears unaccountably nervous (at least as nervous as Spock feels). “It is just that this food rather reminds me of the meals my mother used to prepare on Vulcan.”

Jim’s face creases with concern. “Aw, shit, Spock, I’m sorry.”

“It is true that I have mourned and that I continue to mourn the loss of my mother and my home planet,” says Spock. “Although that is not why I am ...” He pauses, delicately. “On edge.”

“You’re on edge?” Jim’s eyebrows fly upwards. “Seriously? I couldn’t have called that, man. No way.”

“It is not a frequent occurrence to be party to a mind-meld in which an alternate version of oneself has engaged in such acts with an alternate version of one’s captain, Captain. It confuses me.”

“It confuses me that you won’t call me Jim. I mean, old Spock did.” Jim puts down his glass as some manner of realisation dawns. “Hey, are you worried that it’s a slippery slope? Like, one day you’re calling me Jim and the next day we’re making out?” He watches as Spock’s expression grows tighter. “You are! You so totally are!”

Spock’s eyebrows knit together. “It is a logical concern,” he says. “Having heard my own voice say your given name so expressively, and on so many intimate occasions, it is natural that I am reticent to say your name as to do so will arouse those same memories, even though they are not my own memories.”

Jim thinks that ‘arouse’ is the operative word. He leans forward. “Say my name, Spock.”

“Is that an order, Captain?”

\--

“See, I figured why it got to me pretty early on,” says Jim and Spock thinks that if he sprawls anymore he will be horizontal and on the floor.

“Why is that, Jim?”

“My first reaction was just to take it easy, not to worry about anything and if it happens, it happens.”

Spock is unsure what ‘it’ is and can only hope that Jim will get to the point without Spock having to ask awkward questions.

“But then I thought, right, what if it happens again? What if there are more black hole, time-travelling shenanigans and this version of my life gets snuffed out before I’ve had a chance to experience all that, uh...” Jim waves a hand as he trails off awkwardly.

Spock shifts minutely in his seat.

“Oh, shit, I’ve embarrassed you, haven’t I?” And there is nothing triumphant in Jim’s voice. “Shit, see, this is why I’ve been avoiding you.” He taps his temple. “The cogs start turning when I see you and I end up with all these mental images and what ifs rattling around my head.”

Overlooking Jim’s charming description of the mechanics of the human brain, Spock sits up even straighter, as though he is compensating for Jim’s laidback posture. “Those memories, even though they are not my one, have been most distracting for me,” he allows. “Although I fail to see how creating our own versions of those memories could be any less distracting.”

“Oh, now that’s interesting, Spock. That’s very interesting.”

“Forgive me, Jim. I do not follow. What is interesting?”

“I hadn’t even brought up the subject and here you are, all about making new memories.”

Spock’s embarrassment becomes increasingly more evident, even to a man like James T Kirk who, at this moment, wants nothing more than for Spock to stop squirming uncomfortably. Finally, in a low voice, Spock manages to speak. “There is something about you, _Jim_ , that makes me painfully aware that I am half-human, more so than any other human I have met.” He looks Jim in the eyes. “And that was before the mind-meld.”

Jim grins and reaches across to cover Spock’s hand with his and it is not a romantic gesture so much as a reassuring (and very human) touch.

“If it were not for the fact that I know it to be biologically impossible, I should think that some of my organs are entirely Vulcan and some are entirely human.” Spock’s smile is incredibly shaky and incredibly human, so Jim adds _lips_ to his mental list of Things That Are Human About The Vulcan. “My frontal lobe is currently very human or perhaps entirely absent and such lack of inhibitions is concerning.” Spock wants to ask if this is what it is like to be James Kirk; to arrive at a conclusion with no logical preceding steps and to be the happier for it.

Jim grins and moves his hand back to rest on his own knee, fingers tap-tapping away (and if that is the speed at which his heart is beating, Spock is marginally concerned that the Captain will have a fatal arrhythmia before the evening is out). The tapping slow and Spock can almost see the thought processes in Jim’s head. Jim’s face falls. “What about?” He clears his throat, damning himself for being so conscientious. “What about Lieutenant Uhura?”

Now it is Spock’s turn to be reassuring, although he does not touch Jim’s hand. “Lieutenant Uhura ended our relationship earlier today,” he says and he is sure he should be sad about it but Uhura was the very definition of amicable and oddly supportive of Spock during this current crisis.

Jim laces his fingers across his abdomen and smiles brilliantly across the table at Spock. Spock can only smile back, although he is more tentative. His own pulse speeds up marginally as he regards the Captain of the Enterprise and realises that James Tiberius Kirk is in his element: he is engaged on a collision course and he is unafraid.

\--

This entire venture into _Star Trek_ fanfiction (my first, by the by), would not have been possible without a number of people. Therefore this is dedicated to Michelle (the great enabler), Laura (whose freakish nerdboy knowledge kept me on the straight and narrow-ish), Candis (who squee-ed) and Co (who encouraged). This is also for Chelle, with an apology for writing it at all.


End file.
